“Superman’s not coming.”īy signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from Mother Jones and our partners. People “have this idea that if there’s a problem, they’d let us know,” said Brockovich. The updated draft risk assessment is now expected next year, after which there will be an extensive comment period and likely a yearslong review process. In 2011, the agency wrote a draft risk assessment of chromium-6-the first step toward potential future regulation-finding that the compound was “likely to be carcinogenic to humans.” But the draft assessment was never officially released the American Chemistry Council, the chemical lobby’s primary industry group, requested an extension until studies funded by the Council and the Electric Power Research Institute were complete. The Environmental Protection Agency’s assessment process on the compound has been stalled for years, largely because of chemical-industry lobbying. Louis, Houston, and Los Angeles.Īnd yet, federal regulation of chromium-6 isn’t likely anytime soon, experts say. Of the major cities, Phoenix, Arizona, had by far the highest levels, followed by St. Two-thirds of Americans drink water with tests above the state’s “health goal.” About 7 million people drink water from a utility with at least one test above California’s legal limit. EWG attributes the discrepancy to “aggressive lobbying by industry and water utilities” that “exaggerated the cost of treatment and undervalued the benefits of stricter regulation.” Similar situations have played out in New Jersey and North Carolina, where drinking-water agencies set a public health goal (0.06 parts per billion in both cases) but faced industry pushback when they tried to set a legal limit.ĮWG found that of more than 60,000 tests reported to the EPA between 20, 75 percent of water samples had some level of chromium-6. The limit, 10 parts per billion, is 500 times the initial public health goal. Four years later, California became the first-and, to date, only-state to set a legal limit for chromium-6. In 2010, California health officials set a “public health goal” of 0.02 parts per billion of chromium-6 in tap water, saying a lifetime of consumption at or below the goal would pose a “negligible” cancer risk. “Superman’s not coming,” Erin Brockovich told Mother Jones. The program’s 2014 report on carcinogens says they are “known to be human carcinogens.” The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, which oversees toxicity of Superfund sites, has found chromium-6 to be “associated with respiratory and gastrointestinal system cancers.” A two-year study by the National Toxicology Program released in 2008 found that the compounds cause cancer in mice and rats. Meanwhile, evidence of chromium-6’s toxicity has been mounting. Of 81 emerging contaminants monitored in the past 20 years, only perchlorate, a rocket fuel ingredient, has been recommended for regulation. The Environmental Protection Agency classifies chromium-6 as an “emerging contaminant,” meaning that utilities test for it but aren’t held to a legal limit. The contaminant is fueling an ongoing controversy in North Carolina, where residents are accusing Duke Energy of polluting the local drinking water supply. Environmental Working GroupĬhromium-6, rare in nature, is a heavy metal used in a variety of industrial processes, from steel-making to energy generation. Here’s the interactive map with a detailed key. Chrom-6 levels by county, with darker colors showing higher levels.
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